Washington, D.C. — Today, the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, a case relating to the constitutionality of Mississippi’s 15-week abortion ban. Maggie Jo Buchanan, senior director of the Women’s Initiative at the Center for American Progress, released the following statement:
Today’s litigation is the pinnacle of decades of efforts by radical political actors to install a far-right majority on the court that would eliminate the right to abortion. To be clear, there is no reason the justices agreed to hear this case other than a willingness to overturn Roe v. Wade. Doing so would invite legal challenges to fundamental liberties—not only abortion but also many deeply personal matters of family and love that the court has affirmed as embedded in the Constitution.
Such an outcome would rightfully prompt many to fear the extent to which this court would permit government to interfere in their lives as it redefines the contours of our Constitution. In a chilling sign of just how extreme the court may be willing to allow states to go, the justices have allowed a separate, blatantly unconstitutional ban on abortion before many people even know that they are pregnant to remain in effect in Texas for nearly three months.
Overturning Roe will incentivize extremism and do irreparable harm to generations of Americans and their families, which is why the court must do what it has previously and uphold this nearly 50-year-old precedent.
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